Gillian Saga V - The Reaping
by monica.prelooker
Summary: Foyet's copycat is acting out and there's no way to keep Hotch from knowing about the case. This will bring a bitter confrontation between him and Gillian. The team will work the case dealing with his emotional baggage and their own feelings about his actions. **SPOILER ALERT** episode completely based on Foyet's arch -episodes 4x18 to 5x10 - More chapters, shorter chapters
1. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Teaser 1-3

_"__My yesterdays are all boxed up_

_And neatly put away_

_But every now and then _

_You come to mind."_

It's one of those rare days when there are no red flags, so the BAU can take a hideous break from chasing serials to catch up with paperwork, praying for someone to call them up, even if it's to bring a stray cat down from a tree.

Hotch is possibly the only one who appreciates these days, since his paperwork share is meant for five men, not one, and it's been piling up on his desk for days now. So there he is, in the gray May morning, completely submerged in the thousand reports he has to fill.

He vaguely registers the quick click of high heels coming up the steps to his office, and he hopes it's not some secretary with even more paperwork.

A soft knock on the door —please, no more paperwork.

"Hotch, d'you have a minute?"

Hotch looks sharply up at that voice, a smile already taking over his face, and he's already saying: "Sure! Come in!"

He stands up to welcome Gillian and stops, taking a moment to look at her up and down, then he frowns, just about to ask if she's really Gillian. She's wearing a custom tailored suit, skirt, high heels —Regan Gillian.

"What happened to you?"

She shrugs. She's not comfortable in this formal gear, but it definitely _suits_ her.

"Well, you cannot hijack a bureau's jet in jeans, you know…"

But it's her, her smile, her bright blue eyes. And maybe for the first time, Hotch is actually happy to see her there. Now they will finally have the chance to go for lunch, or even a drink in the evening, and talk about that troubled Valentine's evening, the last time they saw each other.

But right away Gillian tries a tight smile and says: "Hotch, I'm here to borrow Morgan, if you can do without him for a couple of days…"

"Morgan? Why do you need him?"

"Well, Boston PD has this case —a murder. I'm consulting for them, but I'm out of answers, and I think any of you guys can figure this out way faster than me and all the PD put together. So I thought of Morgan."

Hotch slightly frowns. What's off? This is not because of their last conversation. There's something more here, something about the case? So he throws the formal answer: "You can tell them to send us the files, we can send them back our analysis. That's the standard procedure," he says, starting to study her.

"No, no need. I'm doing this cos it's from the precinct where I used to work Homicides. Old friends, you know…"

Definitively about the case. Hotch nods at the folder in her hand. "That's the case? Why don't we take a look at it together? Maybe we can find a lead right n-"

"Oh, no, it's ok. You guys have more important things to do-" She meets his eyes and trails off. Hotch frowns deeper, she shakes her head. "It's ok, Hotch, really. Never mind."

She doesn't want to work a profile with him? Or this woman before him is not Gillian or something's really off about this.

His voice acquires a cold edge to ask: "Why don't you want me to see the file?"

"What? No, not at all! I-"

"Gillian, I won't give my permission to Morgan without seeing the case. And you're a lousy liar."

She sighs, knowing she's doomed. To Hotch's suspicious surprise, she closes the door before giving him the folder.

From the staff kitchen, the rest of the team sees her closing the door.

"That can't be good," Morgan says.

Rossi sighs, shaking his head. "No, it isn't."

"You know what this is about?"

"I might…"


	2. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Teaser 2-3

Hotch takes the folder and rests against the corner of his desk to open it. He notices that Gillian is standing before him like she's about to hear her death sentence, hands tightly crossed against her lap and eyes down.

But any speculation dissolves in thin air as soon as he opens the folder.

"What is this, Gillian?" he scowls at her, still trying to believe his eyes.

"A copycat. Well, actually two, according to the coroner's report."

Hotch takes a paper in an evidence plastic bag. It's the same Gillian's showed Rossi in a picture back in February. He reads the date and glares up at her, yet he keeps his voice down, which makes it worse.

"This started _three months ago_ and you're bringing it to us only now_?"_

She holds up his glare, her face all of a sudden almost condescending. Something Hotch's never seen from her, just like he's never heard this dry, even sarcastic voice when she retorts:

"Didn't know the BAU worked finger paintings."

She notices his scowl is about to beat a whole new record, but she's not giving in. He can go bully his agents all he wants. But he's not bullying her. Not about this.

The content of the folder in his hands, her attitude, everything seems to come together to ignite his anger. He roughly straightens up to stand not a step away from Gillian, glaring down at her as he snarls:

"_I_ decide what the BAU works on." She keeps holding up his glare, still that cold, hard look in her eyes. "We're going to Boston."

Gillian swallows a heartfelt sigh. He's too used to puppy Gillian waving her tail at him, and he's about to find out that's so not all there is to her. She's very sorry for him and also for herself, because Hotch is going to see a side of her she never wanted him to know.

Her voice is gauged to frost the road from Quantico straight to the Capitol. "You cannot come."

Hotch is so outraged that words almost choke in his throat. _"Excuse me?"_

She did well closing the door, so no-one else can see him like this.

"You can send your team, but you cannot come to work on this case. You're too emotionally involved."

He slightly leans to her, his voice pouring ice and poison on her as he hisses: "Don't make the mistake of thinking that because you know us, you have any saying on this."

But it takes a little more than that to intimidate her, and she drily, matter-of-factly replies, slightly raising her eyebrows: "Boston PD hasn't invited you, Hotch. I'm consulting for them, it's me requesting one of the BAU agents for a consult. And that's certainly not you."

"Are you challenging my authority?"

"No. I'm doubting your judgment about this case. And your reaction right now does nothing but proving me right."

Hotch turns around and strides to grab his go-bag, mostly because if Gillian were a man, right now she would be picking her teeth from the carpet.

Gillian cuts his way to the door, standing before it, a hand on the knob, openly daring him to push her aside.

"Hotch, you know me. I don't mean to go over your head, or challenge you or anything like that."

No, Hotch doesn't know _her_. He's never had to deal with this hard cold despicable woman standing now in his office, trying to trample over his head and his personal history. And this hateful woman keeps talking in her condescending, now almost scornful way:

"Use your brains, for Christ's sake. You know it's not Foyet: you killed him yourself five years ago. This is some sick bastard trying to take heed of the fear that the Reaper's name still causes in the city."

Hotch is breathing deep, always glaring as he snarls: "Step aside, Gillian."

"Give me Morgan, two days. If we can't solve it, you can bring the whole team in and take over the case. But don't do this to yourself."

Now she's _patronizing_ him! He's really hating her guts, wishing oh so bad she were a guy to kick her ass from here to Sunday. He leans to her again, to snarl some more.

"Don't speak like you know me, Gillian, because you don't. At all. You have no idea what you're talking about. Now step away from the door."

Gillian narrows her eyes, jagged blue steel stabbing him as she lowers her voice almost to match Hotch's. And the cold contempt in her words sends a chill of pure fury running down his spine.

"_I _have no idea? You haven't lived in Boston your whole life. You didn't work with Shaunessy and O'Mara for _years_. You didn't event attend to their funerals. Well I did, all of it. So don't you _dare_ to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about."

"Watch your mouth or I'll have you suspended, Gillian. I'm your superior."

"Well tryna act like one, then: grow a pair and face you have to sit this one out."

No doubt a man would be already bleeding on the floor. Hotch's knuckles are white around the go-bag straps, as he only manages to growl: "Gillian…"

She leans a little more to him. "You don't actually give a damn about my city. You wanna do this only out of _pride_ and _guilt_." She makes those two words sound like steaming shit, and her contempt turns a bit mocking. "And, of course, because no-one messes with Supervisory Special Agent Hotchner, right?."

"You're suspended. I'll notify SSA Cooper personally when I get to our field office. Now step away from the door or I'm calling Security."

She gifts him with an ironic smirk, worse than if she had spit on his face, to say, as she opens the door for him: "Have a nice flight, _sir_."

From the staff kitchen, the others see Hotch launched off his office as Gillian stays behind, and trade openly worried looks. Hotch storms by them, barking on his way to the elevators:

"We're going to Boston. I'll brief you on the way."


	3. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Teaser 3-3

Still standing in Hotch's office, Gillian focuses in breathing deep. She cannot even begin to process all the levels of anger and impotence she's going through. But the hardest thing to stomach is feeling the worst scum on God's green earth for what she's just done to Hotch.

Still, this is not about them, and she had to try to stop him by any mean. For his own sake. Well she's failed, miserably. So now she'll have to take some bullets for him. Hey ho.

Two damned days! Why couldn't he just give her and Morgan two damned days? Use them to cool his head off, study the case and then step in, and prove once more why he's the best profiler in the country. No, of course not.

Her fist still tight against her lips, trying to get a grip on herself, she glances out to make sure the team is gone and finds Garcia standing right outside the door.

The awful thing about Garcia is that she always _notices_. And she doesn't ask, she comes and hugs you, like she does now to Gillian, and you have to be made of cold stone in the bottom of an oceanic trench not to give in.

So Gillian does her math and decides that she has 3 to 5 minutes to completely break down in Garcia's arms. Then she has to gear up again, somehow, and blaze to the airport, because she needs to be back in Boston about the time the team gets to the field office.

What she didn't consider in her math was Cruz dropping by, looking for Hotch. His face loses any trace of a smile at finding them in Hotch's office, Garcia rubbing Gillian's back as Gillian dumbly wipes up her eyes.

"What's this?" he asks.

Oh, no, enough scowling for the morning.

"Just a minute, sir, please. Penelope, come."

She drags Garcia to Jennifer's desk, grabs a stick note and writes down a couple of phone numbers. Cruz follows them, still scowling.

"Here. Call Taylor, he's the primary, and tell him to expect the team at the crime scenes. Call Tanya, I want her and Al to set up shop for them in the conference room. And call Cook, to have him send the official invitation. Give me a minute to call him first, or the damned dinosaur won't pick the phone. And if you as much as smile at Taylor over the phone, I'll have your ass."

Garcia tries a little humor, smiling: "Don't worry, LT, I'll be a lady."

Gillian smashes the stick note in Garcia's hand and turns to Cruz. "Sir, I can give you blood if you take me to the airport right now. Please?"

Cruz opens his mouth, closes it, shrugs. "Let's go…"

Gillian is already on the phone with Cook as she follows Cruz to the elevators. She hangs up right when the booth opens for them. They step in and Cruz asks:

"What happened?"

"My pressure just dropped, sir."

"In Hotch's office. Gillian, you're a lousy liar."

"I'm afraid I'm getting that a lot, sir."

"Are you pregnant?"

"No! I got suspended, sir. I snapped and totally disrespected SSA Hotchner."

"Gillian, you would _never_ disrespect Hotch, and he would never suspend you."

"Well, sir, there's always a first time, right? I'm sorry, I was way outta place, and he really put up with my temper till I left'im no choice. So this is all on me. It's about a case, I'll explain you on our way."

Cruz glances at her. "You know? I really thought you've come to give Hotch the happy news."

"Well, sir, that would make it for the irony of the year."


	4. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 1-9

_"__There is no trap so deadly as the trap you set for yourself" - Raymond Chandler_

On board the jet, the air is thick to breathe as they wait for Hotch to brief them about the case. Rossi wisely tips them off: somebody is copycatting Foyet and the kills added up to three last night.

Hotch is sitting alone, as apart from them as possible, and he's already been through the case file three times. Now he's trying to calm down a little before filling them in.

The bare idea of someone picking on Foyet's work is enough to fill his head with hideous flashes of blood and all kind of excruciating pain. It's standing again in that line 7 bus among the dead bodies, the windows painted in blood. It's an old man calling him over to confess his secret before dying. It's clinging to Haley's body covered in blood as it was slowly turning cold in his arms. It's Foyet's blade slowly thrusting into his flesh again and again and again.

But he's learned to live with all that. He had to, a matter of simple survival after Haley's death. He knows how to handle this gush of awful memories and emotions and sensations.

What makes him incapable of handling them this time is Gillian's betrayal.

It was the last thing he would've ever expected from her. He was _happy_ to see her again, he wanted to _spend time_ with her, he- He's feeling so hopelessly _stupid_.

All of this, going on for _months_, and Gillian never said a damn single word about it! She was even trying to _hide_ it from him. He _trusted_ her, for God's sake! He's even let her take care of his own son!

Is this who she really is? Could he be so damn wrong about her from day one?

Because this was no act. The way she's just _scorned_ him, so cold and sarcastic? You don't just practice it a couple of times in your mirror and pull it off. Not facing such a pissed off Hotch anyway. He's perfectly aware of the effect he can cause on people, and she didn't even flinch. Not once.

The _contempt_ in her eyes and her voice. In _Gillian's_ voice talking to _him_. "Grow a pair", "use your brains", "you're doing this out of pride and guilt", "you don't give a damn", "_my_ city". Jesus Christ! Like she's ever lost _anything_ to that son of a bitch!

His very anger gets him to his feet without any prior rational decision, so he has no other choice than to breathe very deep and join the team.


	5. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 2-9

None of them expects giggles and a red nose from him, but they can't help noticing the angry glow in his eyes and how tight he's clenching his teeth. He ignores their scrutinizing looks and hands the folder to Reid

"This is all we have on the case this far. Three months ago, Boston PD received this message, at the precinct where O'Mara worked. You remember sergeant O'Mara, who was killed by Foyet while we were working the case back in 2009."

The team takes turns to examine the first message.

"Then two months ago, Roy Colson, the author of the book on Foyet, received the same message."

The second message with the Eye of Providence painted in blood passes from hand to hand. While the first message reads "Over?", this reads "Not Over".

"Four weeks later, a month ago, the first body was found. Nina Evans, 25, shot with a 44 Magnum and stabbed 23 times in an isolated area of the city. The autopsy report says that the stabs were done by two different aggressors. No hesitation traces in either of the wounds."

"So this was not their first kill," Rossi notes.

"Then last night, a couple was killed in the Roxbury area. The Matthews were attacked when they were going from their car to their house. Both of them shot and repeatedly stabbed by both unsubs. Nina Evans' driver license was found on Henry Matthews, and his reading glasses' case was empty."

Reid studies the pictures and says: "That, and painting the Eye of Providence in blood by the victims would be the only coincidences with the original case. Roxbury is a highly populated area in southern Boston, and the Reaper always attacked his victims in isolated areas, like the first one in this case."

"And the Reaper was too much of a narcissist to have a partner," Jennifer points.

"Whatever the differences," Hotch sharply cuts them up, "Foyet's death was never made public nationwide, so the news about these murders would cause a very negative impact in the general population, since they'd be taken as Foyet's third spree."

"It didn't make it to the news?" Rossi frowns, surprised.

"No."

"So we're dealing with a team," Rossi says. "We can assume one of them is the dominant."

"And doing this together makes them extremely loyal to each other, aggressive and bold. They encourage each other," Reid points.

"By using a part of Foyet's MO, their work can cause much more effect than if they had to make a name as killers by themselves," Rossi adds.

"You're saying there's no narcissist component in their crimes?" Jennifer objects.

"Yes, there is," Hotch replies. "That's why they chose to copycat Foyet. They want to make an impression, they want people to talk about it, relive the fear of Foyet's sprees in the past. In time they will start to crave to expose themselves."

"This far they only contacted people involved in the original cases," Reid notes. "But the news haven't reported the crimes. If they don't get the recognition they're expecting, they may seek the media by themselves."

"Or make a statement that no-one can silence, like displaying bodies in public places, and adapt their MO to their need of attention," Rossi adds.

"We need to find their signature," Hotch says. "That will lead us to them."

"Where's Reg, Hotch?"


	6. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 3-9

After sulking in silence throughout the whole conversation, Morgan looks up at him and raises his eyebrows. "I mean, she brought this case, right? That's why she was in your office a while ago. So why isn't she here now, with us?"

In the jet's cockpit, the pilot notices a notorious drop of atmospheric temperature in a ten-miles radio around the jet at Hotch's answer: "Agent Gillian's been suspended. That's why she's not here. And she won't be working this case either."

His eyes move over the other faces, as to state that's an order for all of them, while the pilot turns the antifreeze on, to try to melt the thickening layer of ice on the wings.

Morgan's been too exposed to Hotch's cold rage to even blink. "And why was she suspended?"

"For disrespecting her superiors."

"Meaning you? What happened? Maybe she told you that you shouldn't be working this case, considering your story?"

Hotch's faced Morgan's rebellions before, so he drily replies: "Are you joining her?"

Morgan stands sharply up, to level his scowl with Hotch's, and lowers his voice to say, death serious: "No, Hotch, I am working this case. And I'm gonna be right behind you at every step. So you better don't trip."

They glare at each other for a moment, then Morgan sits slowly back down. In the thick silence that follows, Hotch turns on the screen as Jennifer opens the computer before them.

Garcia shows up and Hotch starts: "Garcia, we need an official invitation from Boston-."

To his surprise, she gently cuts him up: "It's being faxed to our field office as we speak, sir."

"And we're gonna need everything the police have on the case."

"Already waiting for you at our field office, sir."

"Who's our local contact?"

"That'll be detective Taylor from Homicides, sir, he's the primary on the case. He and detective Banks are waiting for you at the crime scenes. The Coroner's Office is also expecting you."

"Morgan, you and JJ go to the first crime scene. Reid, go to the Coroner's, Dave and I are taking last night's crime scene."

Hotch turns off the screen and goes back to his distant seat. Jennifer leans to the computer to whisper: "Is Reg still there?"

"Chief Cruz is taking her to the airport. Garcia out!"

Plain to see it's been Gillian who's laid out everything they need to start working.

"She's relentless…," Rossi sighs.


	7. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 4-9

Banks, Gillian's old partner in Homicides, is waiting for Jennifer and Morgan to walk them through the first crime scene.

On their way to the second crime scene, Hotch's phone rings, and Rossi notices his scowl at taking the call, as well as his dry: "Agent Cooper?"

Cooper swallows most of her disgust at the bare sound of Hotch's voice and coldly says: "Welcome to Boston, Hotchner. Do you have any idea how agent Gillian got suspended in a 4-hours-long round trip to DC?"

Hotch's eyes are about to drill the windshield at her words. "I suspended her. You will read my report as soon as I have a moment to write it."

"You must be aware that she belongs to my staff, Hotchner, and I don't appreciate chiefs from other units sanctioning my agents without even consulting me."

"I'm aware that there are two criminals killing people as we speak, Cooper. So I would appreciate if you let me do my job, and we can talk about this later."

"I'm not pulling her off this case."

"That's your call, Cooper. But she won't be working with my team."

Taylor is waiting for them at the scene, still roped off. 30, tall and fit, light hair, blue eyes and strong features. As soon as Hotch sees him, something tells him this guy is that hollywood-kisser eye-candy Gillian was dating back in February. Great. Their local contact's been Gillian's lover. Any more flanks she's going to interfere from?

Hotch barely nods at the man and walks past him, to the car with the Eye of Providence painted in blood on the windshield and hood.

Rossi pauses to shake his hand. "I'm agent Rossi, that's agent Hotchner…"

"Detective Taylor, thanks for coming so soon."

Rossi notices Taylor glances back at their SUV, like expecting more people, and raises his eyebrows. Taylor slightly shrugs. "Thought Gillian would be coming with you guys. We were here last night, but you know her: she likes camping at crime scenes, until she's sure she's not missing anything…"

"She's on her way back from DC as we speak, detective," Rossi softly answers, and they both head to where Hotch is looking at the blood-stained ground.

She's still bedding the man. The possessive strain in his voice sells him out: where's _my_ Gillian. Hotch hopes he can manage out of bed and without his precious Gillian.

"Detective, did you take models of the footprints?"

"Yes, they're being processed."

"Please send them to our analyst in Quantico to speed it up."

"The FBI already has them, agent."

Rossi stands by Hotch looking around. "They got out of the car, and he was going around it to the sidewalk when they were attacked."

Hotch nods pointing across the street. "The unsubs came from across the street, it was a blitz attack."

"Another difference with Foyet: they're not spending time with the victims."

"Not while they're alive," Hotch agrees, calling Garcia on speakers.

She's really busy playing Tetris as she enjoys a colorful lollipop, and she doesn't give Hotch a chance to speak, swelling on him with a mischievous smirk:

"Sir, Kurt —one of LT's techies, just finished analyzing the footprints from last night's crime scene. They match those found at the first crime scene. He's sending us the estimated physical proportions of the unsubs now."

"Ballistics reports?"

"The same 44 Magnum used on the three victims. Tanya's running a search nationwide for a match."

"What about local guns registration?"

"The few owners of a 44 Magnum in the area were cleared before last night's attack."

"Who cleared them?" —let me guess.

"LT interviewed every one of them. Their alibis for the night of Nina Evans' murder checked out."

"Send us the list anyway."

"You already have it in your tablet, sir. Do you want me to email it again now?"

"No, it's ok."

Hotch hangs up as Rossi conceals a little smile. Taylor adds: "No 44 Magnum's been reported stolen or missing in the last 5 years, we've also made sure of that."

Rossi decides to try a little diplomacy. "How is your Department dealing with all of this, detective?"

Taylor grimaces. "We know it's not the Reaper. That makes it a little easier, but it's anyway a low blow for those who worked the original cases. Since we know it's personal against the force, we're pulling old files of arrests from the last 5 years and checking their status."

"Why are you working only the last five years?" Hotch drily asks.

Taylor frowns —are you kidding me? "Didn't you guys kill Foyet in 2009? Plus this kind of blitz attack says they most likely have records, and the footprints match sneakers that nobody over 30 would use, so these guys are in their mid-twenties. Then why go any further back until we're sure about this 5-years period?"

Maybe it's Hotch's imagination, but Taylor's words overflow underlying BAU outlines. Whether he's right or wrong, what they do overflow is Gillian's observations. He briefly nods and strides away back to the SUV grunting: "Thanks, detective. Dave…"


	8. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 5-9

Dr. Rilley is explaining Reid that even though the shots were fatal, the victims' death was accelerated by the exsanguination caused by the stabbing, then the door swings open and Gillian pops her head in.

"Reid! You alone?" she whispers.

Reid nods smiling and waves at her to join him, as he inspects the bodies with the report in his hands. Gillian hurries in and goes to stand with Rilley, trading a smile with him. She's already back to jeans and boots and looking like nothing happened.

"One of the aggressors is right-handed and the other is left-handed…" Reid reads. "What kind of blade did they use?"

"A long knife, very similar to the one the real Reaper used."

"Only one?"

"Or two identical knives."

Reid flicks through the autopsy report and frowns, then inspect the bodies again.

"There's a difference between the stabs made by each of the unsubs…"

Rilley glances at Gillian, she flashes a little smile at him.

Reid goes on, unaware: "The right-handed unsub strikes from above, with all of his strength, in straight blows…" he mimics the blow. "But the left-handed unsub strikes with weaker blows, like he hardly lifts his arm… and sometimes from the side…" Reid frowns. "That's a very awkward way to stab somebody lying before you…"

Gillian flashes a bragging smirk at Rilley, who nods, impressed.

"It took him under three minutes."

"Told you he's out of this world."

Reid looks up at them. "What are you talking about?"

"That difference is more evident in last night's victims, and it's been bugging me since Dr. Rilley gave me the reports this morning," Gillian explains. She goes to stand before Reid and spreads her arms apart smiling. "Stab me, doctor. How would you get these patrons?"

Reid smiles as he produces a pen and grabs it like a knife.


	9. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 6-9

Rossi keeps his eyes ahead while Hotch drives, allowing him two whole minutes to sulk before saying:

"How many levels of personal are you gonna make it?"

Hotch ignores him. Which is, of course, the best thing you can do to keep Rossi going. He knows it, but he's too pissed to care.

"It's her city, it's her job, they're her friends, what were you expecting? Turning your back on her won't change it."

Hotch doesn't even blink. Just what he needed: Rossi flashing foster father badge.

"Why does it bother you so much knowing that you taught her well? Doesn't it make our job easier?"

"She's not a profiler, Dave," Hotch snarls. "She shouldn't be speculating like this. It can send the whole investigation in the wrong direction."

"Only it didn't. And she may not be a profiler, but she was a cop for 20 years, and a very good one. What was it that you called her back in San Diego? Oh, right, _a blood hound who loves the thrill of the chase._"

"All I know is that we have two unsubs to catch and all I hear people talking about is Gillian." Yes, that's what's really getting to his nerves. "We really need to focus on what we're here to do, and get it done."

"Sure. That's why you refuse to use an excellent asset, who knows the case better than anybody else."

"Can we please stick to the case?"

"Oh, weren't we?"

Hotch clenches his teeth.

On their way back from their crime scene, Morgan and Jennifer call Garcia and ask her to enhance some pictures from Evans' murder, focusing on the footprints.

"Ok, I'll send them to you as soon as I have them. Have you seen LT?"

"No, not yet, how was she?" Jennifer asks.

Garcia smiles. "Chief Cruz called it _Irish overdrive_. He thought she was pregnant and Hotch was the father!"

They disconnect chuckling, but Morgan trails off when he glances out his window.

"JJ, look."

Jennifer leans to him to look at Boston PD Headquarters across the street, around the corner from the coffee shop where the hostages crisis took place last year.

Gillian and her father are striding out of the building to her car, together.

"That's Reg father," Jennifer frowns. "Didn't know she'd made things up with him."

"She didn't," Morgan grimaces, speeding up.


	10. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 7-9

As soon as Hotch and Rossi walk into the field office's fifth floor, Tanya comes to meet them with several folders and leads them to the conference room.

In here, everything is very ready for them to start working. Victims pictures and copies from the messages on the board, along with a map of the city with the crime scenes already flagged and a preliminary time line.

On the table, around the speaker phone, five complete copies of every file and report on the case.

Tanya hands Hotch the folders she's carrying, speaking in her usual quick pace:

"Sir, the analysis on the footprints, ballistics' report —no matches, the list of 44 Magnum registered owners in the area with their previous interviews, and the enhanced images Morgan requested."

The avalanche of material to go through somehow helps Hotch to get his head back in the game, and he doesn't snarl at Tanya when he says: "Thanks."

The girl goes on: "No exact matches on VICAP for this MO, other than Foyet's, of course, but there are six similar results, one of them in Massachusetts. Reg said you would know what to do with it."

Hotch's face darkens not at the mention of Foyet, but at the mention of Gillian, he drily nods at Tanya turning to the files. She hurries out.

He's hardly opened the first folder when Rossi's phone rings, and Hotch hears him speaking in a warm conversational way specially designed to piss him even more.

"Hey, kiddo, how was that flight back home? So now you have a Section Chief as a driver?"

Hotch breathes in.

At Taylor's precinct, Gillian steps away from where her father is thundering the room, addressing the staff:

"IT'S AN UNACCEPTABLE LACK OF PROFESSIONALISM AND I'M NOT GONNA STAND IT! TRUST ME! WHOEVER DID THIS, I'M GONNA HAVE HIS ASS!"

"Hey, Dave, heads up. Some stupid cop leaked the double homicide, and that you guys are in town about it. And I'm afraid the leak includes at least one picture, so they have the Eye."

"Thanks for the tip. Who's yelling back there?"

"Oh, that's King Gillian, putting the fear of God in the staff that leaked the story."

"Sounds like he's making his point." Rossi notices she's still referring to him by his name, not _my father_ or _dad_, but he anyway says —mostly to piss Hotch some more. "You didn't tell me you'd made things up with him."

"I didn't. We've agreed a political truce over this case. Gotta go now."

"Well, that's a start. Take care, kiddo." He hangs up and turns to Hotch, raising his eyebrows: "The story made it to the press."

Hotch drops the folder and storms out of the conference room. He asks something to Tanya and goes on to the elevators, brushing past Morgan, who's coming with Jennifer to the conference room.

Morgan just glances back at him, not wasting his breath in comments.

At the conference room, Rossi gives them the pictures, and they're inspecting them when Reid comes in, panting in his hurry to announce: "Only one of the unsubs is stabbing the victims, not both!"

Morgan and Jennifer nod, still studying the pictures. "Yeah, that's what JJ and I saw at the crime scene: only one of the unsubs got in physical contact with the victim. The other one stayed always a couple of steps away."

"Then why the autopsy reports say two different stabbers?" Rossi questions.

"I'll show you." Reid signals Jennifer to stand before him and he takes a pen. "So I'm the unsub, I'm right-handed, the pen is my knife and JJ is dying on the ground, already shot by my partner."

Reid mimics stabbing Jennifer. "These wounds are the firsts. Then he does this… stay there, JJ."

"Sure, I'm dead."

Reid stands behind her, sticking to her back, stretches out his arm before her and mimics to stab her chest and belly, also adding blows from the side. Rossi and Morgan nod, perfectly getting the picture.

"And that's how some of the stabs look like made by a left-handed…" Rossi says.

"Yes. Reg came to the Coroner's, and we took a while role playing it until we found the right way."

Jennifer raises her brows grimacing. "That kind of close contact with his victims, that's pure sadism. He's holding them in his arms to better feel every stab."

Morgan and Reid nod, agreeing, when Rossi's phone rings again.


	11. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 8-9

"Reg, you're on speakers," Rossi says —since Hotch is not around…

Gillian sounds very pissed. "What the hell's going on, guys? I just talked to Colson: Hotch's called a press conference within two hours! We've been wearing our ass out for a whole month to keep this quiet, not to upset the people! And now he's going national on the evening news!?"

The team trades puzzled looks.

"This is gonna make the unsubs lash out!"

"Maybe that's not bad, Reg," Rossi says. "They may make a mistake that can help us to get them."

Gillian snorts, cursing them to herself. How can they be so focused only in the case?

"Jeez, Dave! Can't you see? If one single body pops out after the conference, they're gonna pin it on Hotch! It's gonna become even more personal for him and they're gonna pull him off the case!"

"Reg, you know he shouldn't even be here," Morgan seriously says.

"But he is now! So he's gotta solve this case and shut everybody's ass!"

She hangs up still cursing and jumps out of her car to hurry into the federal building.

Damned Hotch. There are bullets she won't be able to take for him. What's got to him? He can't be so distracted not to see it! The word distraction doesn't exist in his dictionary!

Rossi disconnects grimacing.

"Reg is right," Jennifer points. "We all know the bureau's policy. If they think any of us is being personally targeted or taunted…"

Cooper shows at the door. She's usually a sullen woman, always annoyed and scowling, but now she's very angry. "Where's Hotchner?" she demands.

Tanya shows behind her with a shy grimace. "He went to the third floor, to talk to our press liaison…"

"Well go get'im!"

Tanya's face says she rather walks barefoot on fire than go to fetch Hotch. Gillian is already hurrying to them from the elevators.

"Alice! What is it?"

Cooper spins to bark at her: "It's your agent Hotchner! He goes over everybody's head and now he wouldn't even take my calls!"

"Don't worry, I'll get'im."

"Third floor…," Tanya informs from behind Cooper.

Gillian trades a look with the team and hurries away. Aldana's voice reaches them then: "Agent Cooper! The mayor on line 3, and Commander Flores on line 2!"

Cooper glares at the team, snarling as she brushes away: "I hope at least you have some break in the case, to justify this mess!"

Once they're alone, Reid turns to the others. "What's got into him?"

"If the story is already out, the best we can do is getting ahead of it, so people aren't taken too aback by the similarities with the Reaper," Rossi explains.

"Ok, Rossi, but not like this," Morgan argues. "He's acting like he needs to fight everybody around him!"

"Because he's feeling nobody is having his back on this," Jennifer replies, troubled.

"But that's not true," Reid mutters.

"I didn't say it was, Spence. That's why Reg is right: we need to solve this case soon, with him and for him."


	12. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act One 9-9

At the third floor, Hotch watches the agents setting the hall for the conference, and it makes him feel slightly better. He can't go on bouncing from Gillian's reports to Gillian's lover to Gillian's friends —including his own team. He needs to take hold of the situation in his own hands, set the pace, else he won't be able to work the case out. He needs to get rid of Gillian's hold and do it his own way.

Focus and get it done, just like he told Rossi. And once it's done, he will gladly listen to the whole world's accusations about his behavior, mostly about being so rude with poor little helpless sweet Gillian. He scoffs. If they only knew what a cunning arrogant bitch she really is. Just like her father, what a surprise. No hazard here: only genetics.

Later on he will take the time to hate her like she deserves, to feel like the blind idiot he's just found out he's been all this time, and maybe even feel hurt. And acknowledge this low blow to his personal trust and also how she's managed to turn everybody against him.

Right now he doesn't care. He doesn't need anybody to do his job. All of them can go to hell with her for a beer, for all the damns he gives. Go, trust her, let her in, be as fool as he's been. Sooner or later they'll see and they'll understand. Or not. None of his business.

Her voice coming from the opening booth of the elevator sends icy chills of bitter rejection all over his body.

"I know, dad! But believe me, it will work for us!" she's saying to her precious father on the phone.

She spots him and heads straight to him. What the hell is she doing here? Didn't he suspend her? She shouldn't be allowed to even enter the building! Damned Gillian, always breaking the rules!

"You're not doing a damn thing, you hear me? This is not your department to boss us around!"

She hangs up on her father snorting and cursing, she's already by Hotch. And when she faces him, it's the same mask and the same ironically soft voice she's used to say "have a good flight" this morning. This time she says to him: "Sir, you just trampled on the city mayor, the whole PD brass and SSA Cooper, so I hope you'd be so kind as to answer your phone."

Hotch coldly glowers down at her, like he's being forced to face an ugly, disgusting insect. But she's not expecting any answer: she spins around and strides away, already on the phone again.

Back to the fifth floor, Gillian spots Tanya and Aldana frantically waving at her to hurry over. So she does. As soon as she sees Tanya's screen, her faces darkens.

"Keep a capture and crash it," she orders.

Tanya and Aldana turn to her, not believing their ears. Gillian shoots Tanya a death glare that makes the girl sit back as if Gillian's just slapped her.

"Crash it or leave," Gillian snarls.

Then she strides to the conference room, startling up the team, and turns on the screen. They look up and find the capture of an independent news blog.

The headline reads: "BOSTON REAPER 3 - PROFILERS 0"

Right below, it reads: _"The Boston Reaper strikes again and they call in the guys who already let him get away twice."_

**END OF ACT ONE**


	13. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 1-6

The third floor's hall is buzzing with TV crews setting cameras, microphones, wires. Reporters from all kinds of media are picking seats before the platform.

Hotch is standing near the door, watching them work, when Roy Colson approaches him. Hotch quickly unfolds his arms to shake his hand with a polite smile. Colson is a good, upright guy.

"Hotchner, it's been a while."

"Roy, how are you?"

Colson sighs and shrugs. "Fine. Just wishing this is all over for good. Feels like a nightmare…"

Hotch nods. "Roy, I may need your help during the conference, when-"

"Don't worry. Gillian already instructed me."

Hotch's smile vanishes, but Colson doesn't notice. "This is hard for her, she was so close to Shaunessy and O'Mara, you know…" Colson grimaces, looking ahead. "I still remember O'Mara's funeral… the whole precinct was devastated…"

Hotch frowns, but before he can ask anything, Colson sighs again, pats his arm and goes into the hall to pick a seat. Rossi is coming right after him, and he doesn't give Hotch a chance to speak either.

"The profile will be ready to deliver it to Taylor's people when you're done here."

Hotch frowns deeper —ready? Is it possible that they profiled the unsubs in these couple of hours? Rossi arches his eyebrows, like taking offense.

"Didn't you want us focused on the case? Well, we _are_ focused, Hotch."

Hotch hears the two words Rossi didn't utter: are you? And he's not about to engage in that conversation now.

"What do you have?"

"White, mid-twenties, classic team dynamics, with a dominant partner and a submissive one. The dominant stabs the victims, the submissive shoots them. The dominant allows the submissive to kill in order to keep him engaged and content, and when the victims are agonizing, he gets his sadist feast of them. Having a depending partner feeds his narcissism enough to compensate for not doing the killings himself."

Hotch nods, paying all of his attention to Rossi, glad to finally hear him talking business.

"Right now all we're lacking is the signature, to search them in our databases. But we know their age, that the dominant must have a record, and that they're local and blue-collar."

"Blue-collar?" Hotch repeats.

Rossi nods. "They can blend in in the bad areas of the city, where outsiders stand out and usually get assaulted by gangs."

"Roxbury is a working class area, but the first victim was found-"

"Between Roxbury and Jamaica Plain, off Blue Hill Avenue. That part of Roxbury is ok, and Jamaica Plain is a nice neighborhood, but that specific area along that avenue is dangerous. Very few people venture on the secondary streets at night. Nina Evans did because she lived only two streets away from where she was killed."

Hotch is about to ask how they know that, but Rossi shakes his head, no hint of a smile. "Don't, Hotch. You already know where we got such a detailed information on the demographics."


	14. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 2-6

"Did you know Gillian knew Shaunessy and O'Mara?" Hotch shoots before Rossi can cut him up again.

Rossi doesn't even blink. "Yes. I don't remember her, but she was there the night we gave Foyet's profile to O'Mara's people, back in 2009. She wasn't working Homicides anymore, but she had already worked the first case back in 1998, under Shaunessy, and she was good friends with O'Mara, so she volunteered to help as soon as the first case showed up in 2009."

Flashes of his argument with Gillian come back to Hotch.

_"__You didn't work with Shaunessy and O'Mara. You didn't even attend to their funerals. So don't you dare to tell me I don't know what I'm talking about."_

Now he gets what she meant. But if anything, it only feeds his anger. And she was telling him that he was too emotionally involved? When Foyet killed a personal friend of hers? Cunning, arrogant and now hypocrite too. Looks like the list of her virtues keeps growing to no end.

Jennifer and Reid joining them interrupt his new round of sulking. Morgan is not here, what a surprise. He must be upstairs with his dear friend.

"Anything on the signature?" he asks them.

"We all think that it's one of the stabs," Jennifer says. "This far we've found two that are exactly the same on the three victims."

Reid details: "A slicing blow across the throat and a puncturing wound on the palm of their right hand."

Hotch considers. "The throat is a killing blow, while the hand…"

Reid nods. "That's what we think. Re-They're searching VICAP now."

Gillian is doing it. She's sneaked in to work with his team as soon as he turned his back.

Right then a local agent approaches him to say: "Agent Hotchner, we're ready, sir."

Hotch follows the agent to the platform.

"How is he?" Jennifer asks, concerned.

"Right now? Hating Regan for keeping her head cooler than him and being so damned efficient," Rossi calmly answers.

Jennifer sighs shaking her head, Rossi glances at her.

"But it's better this way, JJ. That is keeping him from reliving Foyet."

"You think she's doing it on purpose?" Jennifer frowns.

"No, but it's working alright."

Rossi turns to look at the platform swallowing a sigh. He hopes she's not doing it on purpose, but knowing Gillian, he can tell she's perfectly capable of such a thing.


	15. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 3-6

In the conference room at the fifth floor, Morgan and Gillian are dinning takeout sprawled on their chairs, feet on the table, watching the press conference.

Hotch is speaking with his usual efficient tone: "George Foyet, a.k.a. the Boston Reaper, died in the DC area in November 2009-"

"Hey…"

Gillian throws back her head to look at the door and sees Aldana and Tanya, the last remaining agents in the office.

"You sure you want us to go?" Aldana asks.

"Yeah, girls, we got this covered. Come back in the morning. Smiling."

"You too, Reg. Go get that Taylor."

"If you need us…" Tanya mutters, still a bit downcast after Gillian's scold.

Gillian is already back to the conference and waves her hand at them. "I'll call ya."

Morgan smiles at them and they leave.

At the conference, Hotch's finished his brief report and now he's answering questions from the reporters.

One of them asks: "Do you have any leads on the actual killers?"

Hotch's answers are solid rock confident and precise. "Yes. We're confident we'll be able to identify them both within the next few hours."

"Is it true that Foyet was killed at the scene of his last murder?" asks a small man from the bottom of the hall.

Gillian sits up. "That son of a bitch!" she growls. She knows that leech. He's smelled blood and he won't stop till he gets it.

Hotch doesn't even blink. "Yes, that's correct."

Morgan glances at her frowning. "What is it, Reg?"

But Gillian doesn't answer, as another reporter asks: "Why wasn't his death reported to the general public?"

"It was. The media covered the event."

"Were you leading the operation resulting in Foyet's death?" the little man from the bottom again.

"Yes, I was."

Colson cuts up the little man's next question to ask: "Is the FBI working with the local authorities?"

Perfect. You can always count on good old Colson.

"Yes, we're about to deliver our profile to the local PD."

"Agent Hotchner, Foyet's last victim was one Haley Brooks?"

Hotch blankly looks at the small man for a heartbeat, then he nods. "Yes, that's correct."

Morgan notices Gillian's eyes shine wet fixed on the screen, lips tightly pressed.

"Do you think the killers will be brought to justice soon?" Colson asks, bless his soul.

Hotch turns to him right away. "Yes, they will, and they will be judged to the full extent of the law. Thank you all very much for coming."

He steps down the stand, ignoring the requests for more questions.

Gillian keeps blankly staring at the screen and Morgan presses her shoulder, frowning. "Hey, Reg, it's ok. Hotch knew they might ask that. Trust him, he knows what he's doing."

Her glare takes Morgan aback. "Of course he does! But it doesn't change that this son of a bitch just pushed him back to the worst day of his life!"

"He can handle it, Reg."

"Can he? For God's sake, Derek! He's human, you know! How is he ever gonna sleep tonight?"

"Reg, that's not up to you or me."

"So what!? We just grab the popcorn and watch him squirm?"

"He knows we're here for him."

Her voice oozes bitterness as she snarls: "Does he. Really." She snatches her car keys from the table and stands up, turning her back on Morgan. "C'mon, Taylor is waiting for you guys."

Morgan stands up too, frowning deeper. "What did you just mean, Reg?"

Gillian is sick and tired of everybody always expecting Hotch to be made of stone, or at least like the rest of them. She turns to glare again at her friend, really annoyed.

"You don't sit and wait for Hotch to call you and say: hey, Morgan, my man, are you up for a scotch? Cos you know, I'm totally down and I really need a shoulder to cry."

Morgan can't help scoffing at the image.

"Exactly!" she lashes.

Morgan's phone rings and he takes the call chuckling. "Yeah, JJ, we're on our way down." He pauses at the door before Gillian with a warm smile. "C'mon, momma Reg, they're waiting for us."

She looks away and shakes her head. "You go, or I may try to hug him."

Morgan kisses her forehead and leaves chuckling again.


	16. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 4-6

The precinct hasn't changed much since the team was here in 2009 for the Reaper case. Only now, among the framed pictures of officers fallen in the line of duty, they can recognize O'Mara's face. And in a glass cabinet, also full of pictures and plaques, they can see Gillian, who's worked here for ten years, up to 2007.

Jennifer and Reid pause there for a moment, looking at a nice image of a bunch of detectives holding a plaque for the whole staff. It's dated 1999, and Shaunessy is holding it, flanked by a young O'Mara and a very young Gillian, the three of them with big bright grins.

By the time they're done delivering the profile and answering the questions from the staff, it's past 10 pm. It's raining outside when they exit the precinct with Taylor, who's carrying a notorious pile of files under his arm. Hotch sends them to the hotel and heads alone to the other SUV.

"He's not coming…," Jennifer sighs, always concerned.

"He's going back to the office. He said he wants to _catch up_," Reid dully quotes.

"It's ok," Rossi tries to ease them. "He knows we're here for him, if he needs us."

Morgan starts the engine with Gillian's words echoing in his head.

Hotch exits the elevator and finds Taylor a few steps ahead of him, heading among the now deserted desks to the small office right by Cooper's, only lit by a desk lamp.

On his way to the conference room, Hotch registers Taylor walking in without even knocking and saying: "Hey, baby. These are the last files you requested." And he automatically deletes it from his memory, determined to block out anything that could distract him from the case.

In the conference room, he pulls a small clean board against the wall, and always keeping his back turned to the door and the empty office, he spends the next hours profiling solo like back in the old days, when the BAU was just getting started.

And it's so good, really diving into the case. This is him.

He allows the job to wash his mind clean from all the bullshit that's been piling up on him along the day, all the painful unwilling and unwanted memories slithering in from the corners of his mind.

And finally a rough outline starts to take form before his eyes, and the pieces start fitting in the puzzle, and there's a clear lead to follow.

Still looking at his board, he calls on the speaker phone, but there's no answer. So he dials on his phone, and gets straight mail voice.

"Garcia, I need a search in VICAP. It's urgent. Call me as soon as you get this."

He hangs up annoyed and hears a soft knock on the door. Gillian is there, and for a moment he sees her again like he's always seen her until today. Even her warm gentle tone conspires to summon the Gillian he remembers.

"Sir, it's 1 am, Penelope's gone for the day. But if you would allow me, I can run the search for you now," she says, fighting to keep his eyes on him and don't look at the board, dying to take a glance at what he's been working on.


	17. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 5-6

Hotch hesitates, then nods and turns back to the board. This is not the moment to rip her open and spill her guts all over Cooper's precious field office, as he would very much like to do. This is work, they have two killers to catch and he needs the search now. He can gut her out later.

Gillian is back in a heartbeat with her computer and sits behind the table, opposite to where he's standing, actually facing his back. "What do you need, sir?"

Eyes fixed on the board, Hotch notices she keeps calling him _sir_, and addressing him with the respect due to a senior officer. For once she's abiding by the proper rules. Like it would fool him. Then he remembers the ongoing blockade and restores it.

"Sexual offenders in the Boston area, knife as a weapon. Go back 10 years. And also any murder victim with a stab in the palm of their hands, nationwide."

"That stab is a no match, sir, I've already ran that search. No murderers nationwide with that patron."

Quick and efficient. Perfect, that's what he needs right now to get the job done. But it's Gillian after all, and she _has_ to ask: "So you think that's his signature?"

Hotch glances at her, scowling. Gillian is a cloth of silk as she holds up his eyes.

"Please, sir, hate me later. You know I'm sincerely interested. And my system is slower than yours, so it'll take a minute. Why did you ask for sexual offenders?"

Hotch turns back to the board. Pragmatism dictates it's faster to answer her than to engage in an argument.

"Have you read about sexual sadists?" he drily asks, not looking at her.

"The manual your wrote, sir."

Like flattery would work. On him. How much of an idiot does she-

"Then you know the knife is mostly a surrogate for forced bodily penetration. A rapist can evolve into doing this kind of things to his victims. He's still forcing the penetration, and he gains more control on how long the assault lasts, and by doing so, he can increase his sexual relief."

He hates to know what her silence means: right now she's looking up at him, and she's slightly frowning, and nodding, absorbing his every word like they were fresh water in the desert. Like she always did.

"And you think w- you can identify the dominant unsub among sexual offenders who used a knife to control his victims. And the victims would have the signature stab in their hands."

Hotch just nods. Then he hears her roughly pushing back her chair and hurrying out of the room. He scowls over his shoulder, in time to see her come back with a pile of files, surely those her hollywood-kisser just brought her.

She drops them on the table and starts to quickly flicking through them as she explains: "The Pinner. He was a rapist here in town, four years ago. Here!"


	18. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Two 6-6

She hands Hotch a file, he opens it and goes through it while she goes on: "The press called him that way cos he would stab the women's hand, pinning them to a door or any other surface, to keep them still as he raped them. He used a similar knife to the one the unsub's using now, and he blitz-attacked his victims on the street."

Hotch reads aloud: "Albert Carson, 27, born and raised in Boston, found guilty on 5 rape charges in 2010…"

He takes Carson's mug shot and sticks it to the board.

"But he never killed anybody…," Gillian argues.

"Check his prison record. He's sure been in fights with other inmates," Hotch replies, going back to the file, completely caught in the thrill of such a concrete lead.

Gillian runs back to the computer and quickly types.

"You're right! Two years ago, a prisoner tried to stab him and stumbled onto his own blade."

Hotch glances at her, trying to omit the enthusiastic smile lighting up her whole face.

"Carson killed him, and found out that stabbing gave him a better pay off than raping women. Check his status, he could've been paroled."

Gillian types so more. Why the hell does she sound so glad every time he's right? "You're right again! He got paroled three months ago."

Then they both say at the same time: "When the first message was sent."

Hotch turns to the board like bitten by a scorpion. She keeps reading from her computer and scowls.

"I'm getting his probation officer's ass for this. Carson's declared home address is right north from West Broadway. That's only parking lots and container yards. And even if he found a hole to hide there, there's no way he'd move to the other side of town."

"Why not? He may not be welcomed back to his old neighborhood," Hotch legitimately and drily argues.

Gillian looks up at him, and then Hotch sees she's about to trip on her usual smartass ways. "With all due respect, sir, Carson used to live in an area people call _Murderpan_. The project he lived in? He'd be welcome back from prison as a local hero."

_It's in her nature_, Hotch sarcastically thinks when she stands up producing her car keys and says: "Tell you what: let's go check that address now, and if you're able to find a residence, and him in there, you can arrest him right tonight."

He holds up her eyes with his best blank face to answer in his best flat tone: "That's not the procedure. We need a warrant and calling the local PD."

She flashes a little smirk at him. "Well, I'm suspended, right? So I don't need to worry about procedure to just check on that address. You coming?"

Now he allows himself to pour a few drops of cold and bitter sarcasm in his voice. "No, I'm _not_, Gillian. I won't damage the whole case over one of your rebellious statements."

Her smirks widens for an instant —suit yourself, then she spins around and leaves. Hotch snorts shaking his head and goes back to his work.

But his concentration just flew out the window —actually down the elevator.

What if for once she's wrong about _her_ city and Carson is really there? He saw she was carrying badge and Glock —of course, Cooper didn't ask her to hand them, because she won't until he fills every little single blank of the proper sanction report. So what if she finds Carson. She will try to make the arrest right there and then. Because Shaunessy and O'Mara and her city and all that crap. And the arrest would be ruled out. And they will lose the dominant partner of the team.

Damned Gillian!

Hotch snorts once again, writes down the address from her computer on his phone and strides out. He will have to load it to the GPS and pray for the damned thing to get wrong and give him a good short route for once.

He gets into the booth.

And she knows the city like the palm of her hand. Plus she has a good five-minutes head start. He will have to hurry to keep her from making a mistake beyond repair.

The booth opens to the ground floor and he walks out of it. He registers the security guard almost yelling on the phone:

"Repeat! This is the FBI field office, requiring EMTs! This is urgent! We have a person down, shot wound!"

Then Hotch spots Gillian's jacket on the front desk, with her ID pinned to it, in case he had any doubt.

And it's again that cold burn in his chest he hates to feel, like his heart is about to stop, as he storms out drawing his gun.


	19. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 1-10

It's pouring out on the street, and through the thick rain, Hotch sees another security guard talking on his radio. And ten yards to his left, he sees Gillian kneeling on the sidewalk, by the wall of the building next door, her back turned on them, head down.

The cold burning in his chest spreads up his throat, squeezing it as he's almost certain she's just been shot.

He runs to her and finds she's kneeling by a woman sprawled on the floor, her blood pooling beneath her. The woman's right hand is pinned to the ground with a big hunting knife over her head, a pair of reading glasses by her hand. She's been shot and stabbed in her belly and she's dying, but still conscious.

Gillian's removed her flannel and she's pressing it to the woman's belly as she holds her other hand, and Hotch hears her saying in a very soothing, warm voice:

"Here, baby, look at me. It's gonna be alright, you just hang on, ok?"

Hotch removes his suit coat and wraps it on Gillian's shoulders, since now she's wearing only a tank top under the cold rain. But she doesn't even register, still softly talking to the dying woman:

"Easy, it's alright, I'm right here, see? You're with me now, Betty, it's ok…"

Then the woman's head tilts on its own weight as she dies.

Gillian takes a deep breath, gently closes the woman's eyes, and leans to reach the knife.

"Wait, Gillian," Hotch says. "This is a crime scene, you cannot touch it."

But she completely ignores him and yanks the knife off the woman's palm, taking the piece of paper pinned with it.

She stands slowly up, soaking wet and stained in blood, letting Hotch's suit coat drop to the ground, and smashes the bloody piece of paper against his chest. She meets his eyes, and he cannot tell if they're raindrops or tears running down her face, as she slowly hisses:

"Fancy another press conference, agent Hotchner, sir?"

Gillian brushes past him, already dialing her phone as he looks down at the paper: it's a print from an online chronicle on his press conference, and his picture is circled by the Eye of Providence in blood. Below it, also in blood, it reads: "fate?"

Gillian voice reaches him. "This is Reg Gillian, send Homicides to my office, we have another victim of the Reaper's copycats… YES, HERE! SEND THEM!"

Hotch closes his eyes, all those horrible memories flashing by inside his head, while Gillian is yelling at the security guard to write down a partial plate in his phone.

Phone. His team. He finds his phone, and he's about to dial when he hears Gillian barking at the other guard, still inside the building: "CALL MY TEAM AND AGENT HOTCHNER'S! NOW!"

She brushes back past him to kneel again by the woman's body. She's yet again on the phone saying: "Alice, wake up and call me."

There's a siren wailing closer. And only now Hotch registers that Gillian's called the victim by her first name.

He circles the body to crouch in front of her and asks in a low voice, already knowing the answer: "Did you know her…?"

She doesn't look up from the woman's face to dully answer:

"You didn't listen when I told you this is my town, right? She was Betty Stullen, 52, mother of 3 cool kids, wife to stupid Charlie. She baked the best pies downtown, and I would buy my breakfast at her bakery, two streets away from here, every single morning since I got my cop badge 22 years ago, just like many other cops in the city…" her lips try to purse in the hint of a smile. "Shaunessy liked her cupcakes, O'Mara loved her doughnuts, Banks dies for her lemon pies… My father and Cook would fall for her chocolate cake… Taylor hooked me up over her strawberry pie…"


	20. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 2-10

An ambulance squeals to a sharp stop behind them, as more sirens wail closer.

Hotch forces himself up to signal the EMTs that there's no hurry anymore, as two police cruisers and Taylor's car come to a sharp stop around the ambulance. While the uniforms hurry to block the traffic and rope off the spot, Taylor runs to Gillian, eyes widening in fear.

"REG! YOU OK?" he sharply halts by her side, sees the body, frowns in disbelief. "Betty…!?"

Gillian takes his hand so he can help her up and nods at Hotch. "I'm fine. Agent Hotchner will tell you what he needs from the scene."

She spins around and heads back into the building.

The BAU's SUV skids around the corner, Morgan 101, sirens on. It squeals right past the ambulance and the team jumps out.

Jennifer spots the blood in Hotch's shirt and runs to him. "Hotch! You ok?"

And Hotch realizes that no, he's not ok. But he can't tell her so.

"I'm fine, it's not my blood," he slowly says, struggling to take everything in and grasp his inner balance back.

"We have your go-bag here," Rossi says, noticing he looks troubled. "Why don't you go upstairs and change your clothes?"

Reid is already inspecting the body. "No kill shot, they left her here to die… And there's the stab in her hand… This could be the last victim's glasses… Is this the unsub's knife?" Reid frowns. "This is Reg's shirt… and Hotch, isn't this your coat…?"

Hotch hands Rossi the chronicle. "This was pinned to her hand…"

Rossi inspects the paper and glances up at Hotch. "The same message as in Foyet's second victims in 2009…"

"Yes, Arthur and Diane Lanessa…" Hotch mutters.

He always remembers the victims' names. Sometimes he wish he didn't. Now he has a new name to remember: Betty Stullen.

Jennifer takes a look at it too. "Your picture is circled like the scrap Foyet sent to Karl Arnold…"

"But it's all circumstantial," Rossi objects. "There are not many ways to circle-"

"Wait a minute! All of you!" Morgan sharply cuts them up. "Hotch, did you remove evidence from the victim's body!?"

Hotch frowns —what? Then he shakes his head, still a little absentminded. "No, I didn't… It was Gillian…"

"She was here? Where-?"

"She's fine, she just went back inside."

Morgan dials his phone as Rossi goes back to the SUV.

"Reg, babe, you ok? Call me!"

Hotch takes the bag Rossi is handing him and says: "I'll see you all upstairs in five minutes. We have the identity of one of the unsubs."

He turns around and strides into the building.


	21. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 3-10

At the fifth floor, Gillian is eagerly rubbing the blood off her hands with wet tissue, shouldering her phone as she paces up and down between Tanya's desk and the door to her office. Tanya and Aldana are already there, and the girl is already downloading the building's security feeds.

Back in DC, Cruz is also pacing, the TV on in his office at his own house, watching a muted news channel, his phone on speakers. He's wearing but his pajamas and his hair is a mess, but he's wide awake, and actually grateful that Gillian had the extravagant idea of calling him at 2 am to tip him off about what just happened in Boston.

"…I'm aware, sir, but you have to keep him here," Gillian is saying.

"There's no way the Director will allow it after this, Gillian, and you know it."

"Sir, please! These punks are not taunting only him but the whole bureau! Pulling him off is a sign of weakness from us!"

One day Cruz is going to make Hotch confess how the hell does he do it, to have a woman like Gillian react like this at the slightest attack against him, and dare heaven and hell to defend him with claws and teeth against whoever hints a flaw on him. Because c'mon, he may be the best profiler, but it's uptight stiffen dry Hotchner, he can't be _that_ good in bed.

Right now, Cruz chooses to take it with a little humor. "First you didn't want him there, now you do. What's with your mood shifts, Gillian? You sure you're not pregnant?"

"Sir! He cracked the case alone in two hours! That's why we need him here!"

"I'm sorry, Gillian, I can't. He'll be back to DC first thing this morning."

Cruz hears his wife coming down the stairs and turns to the door, readying the it's-ok-honey-go-back-to-sleep smile.

"No! Please! I'll be Todd's slave for a year!"

Gillian hears Tanya calling her: "Reg…" behind her, but she's too engaged to pay attention. And she rises the stake: "I won't wear jeans ever again! Please! He's the best!"

Behind her, Tanya lashes: "REG!"

Gillian spins around to glare at her and sees Hotch right by Tanya's desk, only two steps away from her, asking Aldana about the toilets.

Cruz flashes his smile when his wife sticks her head in to check on him, and she's hardly closing back the door when Gillian's voice suddenly becomes husky and promising and —Cruz has to admit it, hot as she says:

"And you know I'll only have the best, right, baby?"

Cruz blankly stares at the door, really wishing his wife didn't hear that. Nor what Gillian's says next: "C'mon, baby, give me 48 hours to get rid of this, and I'll show you why he's the best chef in town."

Then he snaps out of it and scowls at the phone: "Forget it. You guys have 24 hours. And no more jeans."

"You got it! Bye!"

_And if this ends up in my divorce, you're paying the lawyers bill, Gillian,_ Cruz grunts to himself, facing the TV again.

Gillian hangs up and turns to her agents, the three of them with a big what-the-hell scowl in their faces. But there's no time to comment on Hotch's unexpected and so unwanted appearance.

"I brought you clean clothes," Aldana says.

"Thanks, now call Rilley and get Betty's autopsy done right now, and her body released," Gillian orders. "Take care of her funeral on me."

"You got it. Now go get clean, please."

Gillian walks into her small office at the same time that the BAU comes out from the elevators. Morgan spots Aldana and asks her right away about Gillian.

"She's changing her clothes," Aldana answers, pointing at her office.

Jennifer pats Morgan's arm and says: "I'll go."


	22. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 4-10

Alone in the toilets, fastening a clean tie in front of the mirror, Hotch is fighting back the last tormenting flashbacks. And as his mind comes clear again, he realizes something's awfully off here. And it's Gillian.

He knows himself well enough. It's a fact: he doesn't get wrong when he reads people. And he knows Gillian way more than both of them would like. He didn't read her wrong. Never. Until this morning.

Hotch faces himself in the mirror, the traces of the years adding up to the stress of this case getting its toll on him. And he realizes that all along this nightmarish rollercoaster his day's been, something about Gillian has been consistently eluding him.

Like right now, on the phone. Who was she talking to? The hollywood kisser is still downstairs, working the crime scene, so it couldn't be him she was telling about chefs. Not to mention she wouldn't be talking about that nonsense in this situation.

Profile, profiler.

Behavior. What's there and even more important, what's _not_ there.

And the first and most obvious answer is what's missing here: Gillian following his lead. That's been the real main trigger of all his rage —she questioning him for the very first time.

From then on, there's a now evident trail of crumbs connecting everything she's been doing, and what she _didn't_ do. Like having Cruz to remove him from the case, for example. It would've taken her as much as two words about the case and one of her smiles to get it. Yet she didn't.

Well, he won't be much longer on the case, for all that matters. After what just happened, it's just a matter of hours before he gets the call summoning him back to DC this very morning.

The pressure of the case pushes its own weight into his mind. If he's about to be pulled off, he has to manage it to keep his team on it. So he needs to work with them these few hours left, to get them as far as he can, so they can solve it as soon as possible. They don't have much time left. They better hurry. There'll be time later on to go back to Gillian and figure out what she's been really doing and why.


	23. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 5-10

At the conference room, Rossi, Reid and Morgan find Hotch's board, Carson's mug shot, Gillian's computer.

"Looks like he identified the dominant unsub…," Rossi comments.

"Good to know he still remembers to do his job now and then."

Rossi spins around at Morgan's bitter quip and frowns: "He never stopped doing it."

"Yeah, sure."

Reid decides it's time to cool it down and shows them Gillian computer. "Look, here's Carson's address."

Hotch shows up at the door wearing a spotless suit and saying: "We should confirm it, but Gillian said there are no residences there. Where's JJ?"

"She's checking on Reg," Morgan retorts, asking for a blink from Hotch to snap.

But he nods and calmly says: "Good. She knew the victim."

Rossi shoots a "see?" look at Morgan, who stands down a bit. Reid steps in again.

"Here's also Carson's working address," he says, and goes to the map to locate it.

"Is it near Blue Hill Avenue?" Hotch asks.

"Yes, half a mile away."

"That's the area where he used to attack his rape victims."

"And where the first body was found a month ago."

"So what now?" Rossi asks.

Hotch doesn't hesitate. "Morgan, you and Reid go check the home address, just in case. The rest of us will stay here and work on Carson's associates. If Gillian is right and it's a fake, we can go in the morning to his working address."

"But we don't have anything on him yet," Morgan argues.

"If he declared a fake address to his probation officer, that's enough to bring him in."

Morgan ignores the neon billboard Rossi is flashing at him: "SEE?" and nods at Reid to leave. Then Rossi turns to Hotch. He's not leaving the tiniest breach to ask about how he's holding up, so Rossi focuses on business.

"If we get the dominant unsub first, we may never get the name of his submissive partner."

"I know. That's why we need to use these hours to identify him."


	24. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 6-10

Jennifer softly knocks on Gillian's door and walks in. "Reg…?"

She answers from the office's tiny toilet: "Come in, JJ, I'll be right out."

Jennifer waits taking a look around, profiler curious. It's a neat, warm place. A few paintings on the walls, a window opening to the street, a small couch, the desk is full of unfinished paperwork.

None of the many commendations and awards Gillian's earned in 20 years as a cop are here: she's FBI now, so she will hang here only the ones she earns in the FBI. Behind her desk, on the modular, there are some framed pictures.

"You ok, Reg?" Jennifer asks, quietly strolling toward the pictures.

"Yeah. Those son of bitches shot her at our very door. At least we got a partial on their car."

Jennifer takes a quick look at the pictures. Gillian as a little girl with her mother, dead thirty years ago. Connor as a baby and as a teen. The original TPU team, with Ron. A young and smiling Gillian in police uniform, with her father giving her a medal. And O'Mara holding her and Banks at each side, some ten years ago, the three of them grinning. It's not a gallery of achievements, but reminders of loved ones.

Then Jennifer's hand instinctively reaches her sister's pendant in her neck, as her eyes find the newest picture of the collection. It's her own house, and they're all there: Gillian, Jennifer, Reid, Garcia, Morgan, Rossi. Will took it. They're piled up in her couch, laughing, Henry and Connor included.

The phone ringing startles her up. Gillian rushes out of the toilet zipping up clean jeans, open shirt, her hair still wet. She takes the call on speakers as she buttons up her shirt. Cooper's voice thunders the small office.

"What the hell did just happen!?"

Gillian silently huffs. "Take it easy, Alice."

"A woman's been shot at our doorstep and you want me to take it easy!?"

"Call Cruz, Alice. He's already aware of the situation."

"You bet I will! And you're leading again this case as of now!"

To Jennifer's surprise, Gillian flatly answers: "I can't, Alice. Agent Hotchner will have to stay in charge."

"What!?"

"The victim was Betty… from the bakery? So I'm going to notify her family-"

"That's police work!"

"-and then to her funeral, so I don't know what time I'm coming back."

"I want you back by noon!"

Cooper hangs up on her and Gillian lets out a heartfelt sigh.

Jennifer grimaces: "Yeah, guess we're going back to DC…"

"No, you're not. Cruz only gave me 24 hours, but Hotch already got one of the unsubs, so you guys should be able to identify the other one before that."

"You called Cruz…?"

"Yeah, and one day I'm gonna tell you and Penelope about that call, and we're having a good laugh about it."

Gillian pats her hair into place and faces Jennifer. She needs a wingman for this, and Jennifer is by far the best option around.

"JJ, I…," Gillian takes a deep breath. "I'm gonna stay away from the office as much as I can, ok?"

Jennifer frowns, her attention caught by Gillian's hesitating, serious tone.

"If I'm not here, Cooper cannot keep pressing on it." She doesn't say what she's talking about, but Jennifer gets it. "So I won't be around, but you guys use my team as if it's yours, ok?"

"Ok, sure… but what…?"

"JJ, you just keep an eye on him, please. He will listen to you. And call me if _anything_ happens, ok?"

Jennifer holds up her eyes, reading her constant, honest concern about Hotch, and nods with a tight smile at the irony of the situation.

They walk out of the office together as Kurt, the second TPU analyst, comes rushing in and hurries to his desk. Jennifer goes on to the conference room as Gillian pauses to instruct her agents.

"Nothing on the partial, yet," Jennifer reports.

Rossi looks up at her and spots Gillian heading to the elevators. "Where is she going?" he asks.

"To notify the family of the victim…"

Hotch sees Rossi hurrying to pick his suit coat, already heading out, and frowns. "Dave, you can't go now." —not when I'm just about to be pulled off the case.

Rossi pauses only to meet his eyes and say, very serious: "I'm not asking, Aaron." And he leaves.

Hotch turns to Jennifer, like expecting a full out mutiny. She flashes a quick smile.

"Wanna fill me in…?"


	25. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 7-10

The clouds hanging over Boston are far from done, but they anyway allow a dull, pale glow to spread behind them, as the day breaks over the city.

Just like Gillian said, Carson's address was a parking lot, and Morgan and Reid came back as empty-handed as they'd left.

Rossi is back an hour later, and nobody comments about his absence.

While Tanya keeps mercilessly hacking one security camera after the other along the whole block, looking for a clear shot of Carson's car, from when he and his partner pulled over to drop the body, Kurt pulls a list of all of Carson's known associates and everything he founds on these people's background.

So the team sits to go through those files, hoping to find the submissive unsub and waiting till it's time to go to Carson's working address.

When the first agents arrive to start their days, and Cooper clicks by on her way to her office, Hotch softly pushes away his folder and heads to the toilet.

Not a word from Quantico yet. And Cooper didn't even glance at them in the conference room. Tell me about crumbs' trails.

At some moment along this long night, Rossi told him Gillian sent him back to the office because she didn't want any of them at the victim's funeral. She was attending, along with Taylor and a few more cops, as acquaintances, but she didn't want anybody from the bureau there: it'd be like admitting they were to blame for the murder. And she's right.

Another funeral she's attending, like Shaunessy's and O'Mara's, because of an Eye of Providence painted in blood. He's already had a funeral of his own to attend to because of it, a way harder one, but it doesn't make it any more fair for her.

As Hotch washes his face with cold water, he relives in a flash his own fear a few hours ago, when he thought she'd been shot. He just can't help it. Even being so mad at her, he just can't bear the thought of Gillian being hurt.

And now he's seeing her again in the rain, blood all over her, maybe even crying, wording her only real reproach this far, in such a way that nobody else would hear her. And just a heartbeat later, while he was still trying to take in the situation, she was already handling it.

But as soon as the hollywood kisser arrived, she directed him to Hotch and stepped back. More crumbs —who was she talking to over the phone? Who, for her to try to conceal it from him?

Hotch throws the paper towels into the bin and goes back to the conference room. He knows his mind will go on picking crumbs until the whole picture is complete. Right now, it's time to arrest Carson.


	26. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 8-10

He keeps Reid with him and sends the others with Banks to pick Carson. The call from Quantico can still come at any moment, and he wants to be there when it does.

Soon he and Reid finish going through Carson's associates: no-one fits the submissive profile. The second unsub is not in this list. Garcia isn't getting any luck at finding Carson's real home address, where they're sure they'll find some kind of evidence to tie him to the murders. Carson only uses his credit car near his work.

Then Aldana shows at the door: Tanya has something.

They gather around her desk and she shows them her screen full of security footage from cameras along Blue Hill Avenue.

Tanya explains: "Penelope gave me the addresses where Carson usually uses his card, so I accessed their cameras and started to follow him. The last camera that shows him is here, Blue Hill and River."

"That's the area where he lived before going to prison," Reid notes.

"Yes, three streets away, and he turns the corner like going to his old address."

"Anything on the car?" Hotch asks.

It's Kurt who answers him: "The plates belonged to a vehicle that was reported stolen a week ago, but the model doesn't match our images: it was a white pickup."

"Good work, try to find more," he says.

Soon Rossi calls from the police station: Taylor and Banks aren't getting anything from Carson. He's too used to be questioned and bullied. All he's said is that he will only talk to Hotch, and nobody else.

Morgan and Jennifer are on their way to interview the prison guards where Carson did his time. So there's nothing to do but to let Carson sweat it and pray for them to find something useful.

And they do. The guards tell them at first that Carson didn't have any friends in prison.

"You know nobody likes sexual offenders, and he wasn't exactly a charmer."

"Maybe a younger inmate," Morgan tries. "Somebody who didn't really belong here. Other inmates would pick on him on daily basis…"

That rings a bell for one of the guards. "There was this kid… they called him _Mary Jane_, so you can get the picture. I think he was the only one I ever saw talking to Carson."

"Did Carson protect him?" Jennifer asks.

The guards nod, agreeing. "Yeah. He got in a couple of fights for him, a man died. After that, nobody messed with them again."

Garcia calls Hotch and Reid, Morgan and Jennifer also on the line.

"Hotch, I think we found the submissive. He met Carson in prison," Morgan reports.

And Garcia brings the facts: "Tommy Ledger, 25, also local. He and his mother were regulars at the ER thanks to his father. He was also bullied at school all the time. Once he tried to burglarize a convenience store and the owner beat him down before calling the police. He got out six months before Carson, but kept visiting him in prison every week."

"He fits the profile," Jennifer says. "And Carson saved his life several times in prison. They told us Ledger would follow Carson around like a puppy."

"The incident when Carson stabbed the inmate was defending Tommy," Morgan adds.

"And they work for the same subcontractor in construction," finishes Garcia. "I'm sending you his home address, sir."

"Thanks, Garcia. JJ, Morgan, meet me at the station."

Hotch and Reid are about to walk out when Cooper finally shows at the door wearing her best scowl.

"You go," Hotch says to Reid. "I'll meet you there."

Reid hesitates, because boy wonder always notices much more than anybody thinks he does, but Hotch nods —it's canon: I'm fine.


	27. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 9-10

The conversation with Cooper is basically Cooper's angry monologue, mostly because Hotch lets her vent out, saying nothing and doing nothing but nodding now and then. He's finding it very informative though, and he's too busy picking up Gillian's crumbs dropping from Cooper's words.

When the woman finally shuts up, now angry at his lack of reaction, Hotch nods for the last time, spins on his heels and takes his leave in complete silence.

On his way to the police station, the crumbs fit the puzzle just out of pure inertia.

Gillian wasn't scorning and defying him yesterday morning: she wanted him to give her and Morgan two days before taking the case, by tricking him into a challenge. She wanted him to give them those two days to fail, and then hand the case over to him, proving he was right —they couldn't do it solo. But giving him those two days to be able of taking the case with a clear head. That's why she took on that attitude, to trigger his pride, not his anger. She was counting on Foyet's wounds going so deep, but she wasn't counting on her own attitude taking him so aback and hurting him so much —actually, neither did he.

When she failed in stalling him, she cleared their way of any obstacles both with Cooper and with the local PD, so they could start working right away. Recalling her argument on the phone with her father, when she went to the third floor, he understands it was defending his call to a press conference.

She helped the team providing specific demographics. She identified Carson based on his profile —once more, he gave her information, she turned it into facts, the way they've always functioned.

Now she's somehow talked Cruz into keeping him and the team on the case for another 24 hours, right after holding the hand of someone she knew, shot and stabbed to death mostly because of his press conference —and that's who she was on the phone with, it was Cruz, she made up that chef silly comment to conceal she was actually talking about Hotch.

And finally she's refused to be in charge of the case again, making everybody from Cooper up straight to the bureau's brass to keep him leading it, in order to have it quickly solved and filed away —easier than picking somebody else that would start from scratches.

Hotch takes a deep breath as he pulls over outside the precinct. She's been doing nothing but trying to protect him. As simple as that. Gillian was protecting him. From himself and from everybody else, while taking all his shit without a single word to defend herself. And he can only see it now, when the bastards toying with Foyet's MO have a face and a name, and the past can be kicked back to its right place.

His guilt is ruthlessly whipping him as he gets out of the SUV: please, oh sharp SSA Hotchner, tell me now about loyalty.

Tell me about _love_.


	28. Gillian V The Reaping Act Three 10-10

His guilt doesn't make him miss the fact that the precinct is completely deserted. Not even the officer at the front desk is in his post. Like an H bomb just fell here, all desks and posts are vacant.

He pauses, frowning. Then he sees Morgan, Rossi and Taylor coming from the small hall leading to the interrogation room. And they look _amused_.

"We have Carson's real address," Rossi informs as they head to the street. "We'll call you from there."

They don't pause, they pass by him, while Morgan chuckles shaking his head and Taylor scoffs: "Banks always tells me about it, but watching it firsthand…"

Hotch's frown turns into a mild scowl as he heads to the interrogation room. When he's only a step away, he hears at least a dozen voices letting out a "uuuh…!", just like when you're watching a movie and somebody takes a kick in their groin.

Then he walks into the hall: the whole staff is there, gathered around Jennifer and Banks before the one way mirror, and they actually look like watching a movie.

Hotch brushes his way to Jennifer and looks into the interrogation room. Gillian is interviewing Carson, looking more like Cooper than like herself, with her tailored skirt, high heels, bun and reading glasses on. Reid is sitting back against the wall at the furthest end from the table, also with his reading glasses on, taking notes.

Jennifer tries to conceal her smile as she quickly says to Hotch: "Rossi authorized this, and we instructed Reg about Carson's narcissism. Don't worry, they're doing fine."

Hotch stares at her, rather blankly, and Jennifer adds: "She presented herself as your secretary, only good for paperwork and coffee, because you're too busy with reporters and chasing Tommy. It's plain reversed psychology, but it's working. "

Banks is 45, with some beer belly and a nice, hardened face. He was Gillian's partner for seven of the ten years she worked Homicides, and together they used to have the best rate of solved cases, the watch-and-learn team for green-shots.

Now he comes to stand by Hotch with an ironic smile as he says: "And now she's gonna make him snap…"

Right then Carson stands so sharply up, that he drags with him the table he's cuffed to. The staff lets out another "uh…!" and some giggles. Hotch's reaction is trying to reach the door before Carson attacks Gillian, but Banks stops him shaking his head.

"Give'er two minutes, agent. Trust me, I've seen her doing it a thousand times."

Hotch stays there, flanked by Banks and Jennifer. He knows they think he's trying to step in because he's afraid she's going to screw up. And he can't tell them about the mild burning cold in his chest at Carson's violent outburst so close to her.

Right now Carson is yelling at Gillian:

"I PLANNED IT! I SENT THE MESSAGES! I STABBED THOSE JERKS AND PAINTED THE EYE! TOMMY!? HE CAN'T FIND HIS OWN ASS IF I DON'T TELL HIM HOW! AND HE CAN'T EVEN STAND THE SIGHT OF BLOOD! WHY DO YOU THINK HE SHOOTS THEM?"

Gillian gawks up at him in disbelief. Carson sits back down smirking at Reid.

"It's _me_ you're gonna study for years," he brags, and turns to Gillian: "So are you calling your boss now? Or you're leaving me with four-eyes for an interview?"

Gillian pushes pen and paper to him. "Of course I'll call him. And Doctor Reid needs you to write down everything about the murders, in order to prepare the interview."

Carson grabs the pen smirking again at Reid. "See you soon, doctor."


	29. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 1-9

Gillian and Reid exit the interrogation room, leaving a uniform to watch Carson, who's happily writing down to the last detail what a mastermind of crime he is, already picturing his face in newspapers, magazines and the TV all over the country.

The staff goes back to work chuckling and commenting, and Reid is shaking his head amused as he joins Jennifer. Gillian drops down her dark hair, smiling as Banks pats her shoulder. "You never let me down, Reg!" he chuckles, and heads back to the main office. Jennifer takes Reid away following him.

Then Gillian goes to stand before the window, a couple of steps away from Hotch, and they both watch Carson as he keeps writing.

Hotch is very aware of her there with him, the two of them alone in the small hall. It's a good moment to say something. To say I know what you've been doing for me, thanks, I'm sorry for being such a blind selfish asshole. But he just can't find a way to even start to say it. Because if he has to be completely honest with himself, the only thing he really wants to do right now is taking her in his arms and hold her tight to apologize to her. And try to tell her what he's just realizing that he feels for her.

But none of it shows in his usual serious, focused, almost scowling expression. So when Gillian glances at him, she only sees him lost in his own thoughts.

"C'mon. Bring it on already," she grunts.

And Hotch hears her, and forces himself to keep staring at Carson, because he's afraid that if he faces her now, all what keeps flogging him will show.

Gillian nods, sighing, and slowly heads to the main office.


	30. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 2-9

It's past noon when the warrant arrives to arrest Tommy Ledger. Rossi and Morgan are still at Carson's apartment, canvasing the place. They've already found Carson's knife and a sweatshirt stained in blood.

Hotch decides to cover not only Ledger's home, but also his work, and sends Reid there. Gillian asks him for permission to join Reid, and Hotch swallows his surprise at her missing the arrest and agrees. Only after they leave it strikes him that maybe she doesn't want to be around him.

Down at the underground parking lot, Gillian throws her car keys to Reid. It's a habit since Reid started visiting her and Connor in Boston: boy wonder always drives. She argues that it's because she knows that he hardly gets to drive when he's with the team on a case. But that's not the only reason.

Gillian first realized she was completely doomed about Hotch when she surrendered her car to him without a question, a year ago, working the Woods' case —those stupid little things that speak so loud about us. But she doesn't want Hotch to be the only man on earth with that privilege, so she decided that even when he's not aware, he's to share it with Reid, who she sees like a dear surrogate little brother and who's actually a very good driver.

So Hotch, Jennifer and Taylor lead the locals to Ledger's house. He's not home, but Hotch compensates by arresting his abusive father for obstruction of justice, when the stinky drunk fat man tries to block their access to the house.

Reid reports that Ledger's abandoned his workplace right after Carson's arrest and nobody has the slightest idea about where he might be.

All of Jennifer's talents working on Ledger's mother can only make the shocked and beaten woman mumble that "Tommy hardly comes home these days." But that's enough for Hotch to figure it out.

He calls Rossi and tells him to have the CSU leave the apartment right as it was and send all the police agents away. He and Morgan have to circle their way back and wait for the rest of the team, because Ledger will sure show up there, as soon as he's sure that the police is gone. His dominant partner has been taken away from him, his home is hell on earth, so he's going to go to the only place where he's ever felt safe: Carson's apartment.

It's a long waiting, since Ledger is too suspicious and too scared to show up in broad daylight. But all of them are used to long watches. Hotch and Jennifer in one of the SUVs, Morgan and Rossi in the other, Gillian and Reid in Gillian's car, they wait hour after hour, scattered around the corners from Carson's apartment. Taylor is keeping the SWAT and uniforms back up four hundred yards away, also standing by and ready.

The building has a parking lot in the back and a dead-end alley at one side, to which the fire escape of the apartments opens.

Nobody says much, all of them interconnected on the radio. They briefly comment on Carson's complete confession and what Morgan and Rossi found at his apartment, but they soon fell again to silence.

Slowly the day comes to an end and night closes over the city. Reid, watching the building with his binoculars, gives the heads up:

"He's here."

"Wait until he goes in," Hotch says on their radios.

Ledger surreptitiously sneaks across the street to the building, and opens the door glancing over his shoulder, then he hurries in.

"Go!" Hotch orders.

Gillian calls Taylor as she gets out of her car: "Bring in the big guns."

The SWAT unit soon joins the team at the building's entrance and they all go in, while Taylor stays behind with the uniforms, in case Ledger tries to get away.

As they go up the stairs, Hotch notices Gillian and Morgan flanking him, only half a step behind him. Before Carson's door, he thunders the usual: "TOM LEDGER! FBI!" and SWAT breaches in. Hotch follows them up close, and gets a glimpse of Ledger running to the bedroom.

Behind him, Gillian sees how he storms in and falls back, touching Morgan's arm, and they sprint down the stairs together, aiming to reach the alley before Ledger.


	31. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 3-9

Hotch storms into the bedroom in time to see Ledger jumping out the window to the fire escape, and runs after him. Ledger is already one floor below when he climbs out the window and runs down the shaky metallic stairs.

Gillian and Morgan run into the alley right in time to see Ledger jumping from the second floor. The young man sprints away producing his huge 44 Magnum. Hotch sees the other two chasing him but keeps hurrying down the last flight of stairs.

Then Ledger glances over his shoulder, spots Hotch and shoots him as he keeps running.

Gillian's heart freezes for a split second, seeing Hotch slamming back against the wall behind him, taking his right hand up to his chest or his shoulder.

Then everything goes red.

A mad fury overcomes her as she sprints stretching out her arm and her gun, even outrunning Morgan as she shouts:

"FBI! DROP YOUR GUN!" and she shoots.

She's incapable of registering everything of what happens. But she hits Ledger's right arm, making him drop the Magnum. She keeps chasing him to the very end of the alley, where she roughly grabs him and throws him back against a wall. Ledger sticks to the wall, hands up high and eyes widening in fear when Gillian puts her gun between his eyes and cocks it.

"REG! WAIT!" Morgan shouts behind her.

"Is he ok?" she manages to ask through tightly clenched teeth, not glancing back, not lowering her gun.

The rest of the team is already back on the street, and an EMT is checking on Hotch, who's got his left arm hardly scratched by Ledger's shot.

Then they hear Morgan on the radio saying: "Reg, let me take him in."

They trade frowns and Jennifer and Reid hurry to the alley to see what's going on. Gillian's voice thunders the radio: "IS HE OK!?"

But Morgan insists: "Reg, easy, lower you gun…"

"AGENT HOTCHNER!?"

Hotch looks up, surprised, as Rossi gets the situation right away and says: "He's fine. It was just a scratch."

At his words, Gillian secures her gun and steps back, still fighting her urge to shoot Ledger. Morgan hurries to cuff him and yank him away from the wall. But as he's taking Ledger away, the young man smirks at Gillian and whispers:

"That was agent Hotchner? If I'd only known…"

A shot hits the ground, right by Ledger's foot, and he jumps aside in a jolt. Morgan grabs his collar and turns around, to find Gillian still pointing at the man's feet.

"Say it again, you piece of shit," she growls.


	32. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 4-9

Morgan sees Reid and Jennifer a few steps away and pushes Ledger toward them.

"Take him away! Now!" he urges.

They do, trying to get what's going on. Then Morgan stands before Gillian, always holding her gun and heavily breathing, and cautiously approaches her.

"Reg…?"

She completely ignores him. Morgan pulls off his radio, so nobody else would listen, and speaks very smoothly: "Talk to me, baby. It's me, Derek…"

Gillian takes in a very deep, shaky breath and holsters her gun, her eyes still glaring past him at Ledger's back, away down the alley.

Morgan exhales and goes to stand right before her, blocking her view and forcing her to face him. And he's completely taken aback by the furious tears Gillian is fighting back. She pulls off her radio too and mutters:

"For a moment I thought…"

She trails off and looks away, slightly shaking her head, as she gets a little grip back on herself. Morgan frowns, studying her as everything finally makes sense.

"This is why you wouldn't join our team?" he asks.

Gillian brushes past him snarling: "What d'you think, _profiler?"_ and stalks away.

Morgan closes his eyes grimacing.

Ledger is already in custody in a cruiser, and the team is waiting for Morgan and Gillian when Rossi's phone rings. He checks the call and takes it looking up at the alley.

"Yes…?" he says, very tentative.

Halfway to the street Gillian says, still unable to sound but very stressed up, and dry in her try to fight it: "Dave, you guys go to the hotel now, I'll take care of everything back at the office."

Rossi can tell the last thing she needs now is questions, so he only says: "Okay…"

Gillian stalks out of the alley, phone to her ear, and quickly waves at the team, not pausing on her way to her car. She doesn't even glance at Taylor, a few steps away.

"See you guys tomorrow at home for lunch, ok?"

"Okay…"

Rossi hangs up as she gets in her car and roughly closes the door.

SWAT, the cruisers and Taylor drive away heading to the precinct. Morgan joins the team as they watch Gillian's car rocketing away in the opposite direction.

"She ok, Morgan?" Reid asks. "She looked upset…"

Morgan just nods, grimacing. Rossi lets out a diplomatic sigh. "Shall we? I could use a drink at the hotel's bar, and a little rest."

Jennifer frowns. "But we should go first to-"

"Not tonight, JJ," Rossi gently cuts her up.

They split up to go to the SUVs and Hotch cuts Morgan's way. "What did just happen?" he seriously asks.

Morgan holds up his eyes like he's about to punch his lights out —and he is.

"You really don't know?"

Hotch scowls at Morgan's bitterness, but Morgan just dodges him and walks away.

He has a very good theory about what happened, but it's too wild to take it for granted without any kind of confirmation.


	33. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 5-9

The fifth floor is empty and it's pouring buckets outside. Everything is quiet, only the soft rumor of the rain. And that's exactly what Gillian needs right now.

Her hands are still slightly shaking as she picks every file and picture in no hurry, boxing up all the material of the case. She needed to change her shirt as soon as she got here, because she was drenched in sweat, and she's grateful her eyes aren't too reddened after crying her heart out for half an hour like she just did.

This can't go on. It just can't. She needs to find a way to overcome herself and stay really away from him for good. She still feels a chill at reliving the blind mad fury that took her completely over not an hour ago. She can't believe she was so eager to kill that man because he may have hurt him. She can't lose it like this. Not when her job implies guns and lives at the stake.

So this just has to stop. Somehow.

She knows there's no way to help what she feels, she's not naïve. Yet, she has to find a way to keep her feelings from threatening lives, or from making her go again through the hell that these two days have been.

They're leaving tomorrow, and she can bet he won't show up at her house with the rest of his team. So that's already been all, thanks God. She doesn't need to hear or know from him anymore. At least until she learns to live with it. Hopefully she can do it before her next life, if reincarnation happens to be true.

And it's so damned painful. This deep longing for him and this realistic need to keep him away. This feeling so hopeless and stupid beyond any logic. This being willing to expose herself to so much shit just because of him.

She knows she can't just ban him off her mind and her heart. That'll be just like trying to keep the sun from rising in a few hours. And she's feeling guilty in advance, knowing she will have to keep her eyes wide open with Taylor for a good while. But it's already been too long fighting not to let him slip into her mind every time she as much as blinks.

She can't go on holding her breath every time she steps into an elevator in Quantico. Or making up excuses not to go to the sixth floor when Cruz calls her over. Or having the personal numbers of the whole BAU team but refusing to have his, because then she would have to fight her need to call him, if only to hear his recorded message in his mail voice. She's sick and tired of waking up so many mornings to realize she's just dreamed of him. Again.

Tonight she's just had more than enough. And she really needs to hold on to this feeling of being through with it, because in time it'll help her to put herself back together and move on.


	34. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 6-9

Lost in her broody thoughts, she doesn't hear the elevator booth opening, nor the firm steps striding across the empty office. She only hears, all of a sudden, the soft knock on the conference room's door. And when she looks up, there he is. Hotch is standing at the doorway, wearing a flawless black suit and a red tie, observing her with a very serious look.

Gillian manages it to force a quick, tight smile and resumes her boxing as she says, in a carefully neutral way: "Agent Hotchner, you didn't need to come by…"

"I came to have a word with you, if you're not too busy…"

Okay, here it comes, the scold he's been harboring since yesterday morning. Of course he's kept it as a farewell souvenir. It's very like him: first getting the job done, only then let's throat Gillian.

Now she doesn't look up to say: "Sure, what is it."

Hotch speaks in his low, calm, but somehow impersonal way, playing the only tape he's been able to ready on his way here:

"Gillian, I wanted to apologize to you. I've been unnecessarily rude with you over these last two days, and it's not only very out of place, but very unfair, since-"

"Hey…"

"- you were right all along about me, being too emotionally involved to correctly work this case, and-"

"Agent Hotchner, you don't need to apologize."

And she means it: she just wants him out of here and away. Forever. Because he's just too much for her to handle. There was a time when she fancied she could hold it up, despite knowing he doesn't want her anywhere near, and be around now and then. But tonight she's finally realized that she can't. And the simple fact of having him there before her is killing her.

But he replies: "Yes, I do."

"Trust me, sir, it's ok." Will he ever listen to her, other than to be pissed at what she says?

Hotch's eyes move over the table before trying to explain: "You're barricaded behind those boxes, you're avoiding eye contact and you keep calling me agent Hotchner. And sir. So it's not ok."

Great. Let's profile Gillian for the kicks. She's getting mad at him, and it's really good. Another feeling she needs to hold on to. So she picks a box without the slightest hint of a smile and heads to the door. Hotch quickly steps back to give her way.

Now he wants to apologize, and he won't leave until he's sure his apology is accepted. Fine. As she walks out to head to her office, she says, trying not to sound dry and cold like Cooper on a good day:

"Look, if it stops raining, your team is invited over to my place tomorrow for a barbeque. You're more than welcome to join us."

See? Apology accepted: you're even invited to join the gang. Now please _go_.


	35. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 7-9

Hotch watches her walking into her office, dropping the box and sitting behind her desk. He sighs. She's completely walled up, no wonder. He needs to bridge over to her, push her past her so justified and understandable anger and hurt, to be able to tell her all he needs her to know.

So he goes to her office and shows at the open door, to ask in a mildly concerned way —so she won't think it's pity: "Gillian, what is it?"

Say it, spit it out, I'll take it. But don't shut down on me like this.

She's trying to fill a report, and she keeps writing as she tiredly says: "One long day, sir, that's all."

Hotch never thought that somebody calling him sir would bother him this much. He comes to stand behind the chairs before her desk, softening his voice.

"Talk to me, Gillian, I can tell you're upset."

I know you, remember? Not as much as I thought, maybe, but anyway enough.

She keeps writing. "Yes, I am, and Cooper's gonna have my ass if I don't finish these reports before tomorrow morning."

"Gillian…"

She finally looks up at him, to face him annoyed and grunt: "Agent Hotchner?" —What the hell do you want from me now? Can I just get a little break?

"What happened back in the alley?" he asks, frowning a little, because that's what he needs to know before saying anything else.

Gillian resumes trying to write and drily replies: "Nothing happened. Morgan and I got the unsub, just like I told you we would."

"What was that last shot?"

"Drop it, sir, please."

It's a serious warning, but he needs to know. Out of habit, his voice gets flooded with authority —I outrank you: "Tell me what happened."

Gillian breathes in. You wanna know? Fine! Actually, why the hell not? She smashes the pen against the report.

"What happened!? I almost shot that punk between his eyes, just because for a second I thought he had hurt you! That's what happened, _sir!"_

Hotch holds up her eyes, still frowning. Yes, that's what he thought. Only he didn't expect her to get mad at him because of this, of all things.

His silence just feeds this anger she wants to hold on to, pushing her to go on. What can he do? Suspend her? He already did, right?. Turn around and walk away? God bless him if he does. And after all, it's not such a bad idea, to fill him a little into what's really going on.

"I lost it! Ok? Because that's what happens to me when you're around! Doesn't matter if you treat me like the worst piece of shit! Whenever you come into the picture, I just can't care about anything else!"

She glares up at him —happy now?

Hotch nods, still frowning. Good, she's said it, now they can move on, so he says: "It's ok, Gillian. I know you have feelings for me, and I-"

"Oh, please! Spare me the profile!"

Her rough interruption doesn't affect his calm, methodical tone.

"Gillian, I was trying to say that I understand what happened, because it happens to me every time I see you in danger. Which is pretty much every time we work together." —There. That. Step by step. Take it in so we can go on, cos I'm just getting started.

"That's because you sort of took me under your wing, and you don't like your agents taking risks," she grunts, annoyed at his silly try to rationalize it. They're feelings, they cannot be rationalized. She doesn't want them rationalized. She wants them —and him off her system.

But he says, showing a little of his puzzle at her conclusion: "That's not why, you know it." Because she _has_ to know it. There's no way she doesn't.

Right then a low beep catches Gillian's attention and she roughly opens the computer at her side on the desk. She checks it and scowls. Somebody is accessing the feed of the security camera placed right above her office's door. And there are only three people skilled enough to hack it: Garcia, Connor and Tanya. She hits a key. One of them is getting their system crashed. The launched worm shows her an IP from DC. Nice try, Penelope. I love you, but tonight you can very well go to hell.


	36. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 8-9

She cannot even try to smile at Garcia's peeping. Not with Hotch still there, studying her like she's some kind of freak or mental case. And then he lands the cherry on this hideous pie:

"Is it that bad?" he asks, truly interested. "Feeling what you feel for me?"

Gillian yanks the glasses from her face to shoot her worst death glare at him.

"Oh, you mean _loving_ you? Well you tell me, agent Hotchner! Is it bad that I have you standing there, wearing my favorite of your suits, and instead of fancying some wild night, all I can think about is Wednesday breakfast, and waking up to you before going to work?"

And that's it. That's the exact measure of my lack of wits and common sense. That's me for you, SSA Hotchner. That's how terribly wrong and stupid I am when it comes to you! Now suspend me again, go away and leave me be for good!

But Hotch nods with a little smile, captivated by those two words that just painted the best picture he would never be able to harbor: _Wednesday breakfast_. They just distill it so perfectly, implying every little detail of what would take to someone like him and someone like her to share breakfast at home on a working day, and why.

So he softly says: "Yeah, it's the same for me. I think it's called aging."

That takes Gillian completely aback, the more when he smiles a little wider and adds: "Let me buy you a drink, and we can talk about this."

But then she gets it and shakes her head, looking away from him. Oh no! He's not buying her the pity drink to offer her some stupid friendzone! Not in a zillion years!

Hotch frowns again. No? What does she mean, no? She's just said —actually yelled to his face, that she loves him. Why wouldn't she allow him to say he feels the same?

Gillian stands sharply up and goes to stand before her window, arms folded, turning her back to him. She's struggling to keep her cool when she says:

"Sir, I know you never listen to a single word I say, but right now I really need you to leave me the hell alone."

Her words are a bucket of cold water on Hotch. What? She can't really want him to leave. Not now.

And yet his eyes do nothing but tell that she really means it. Like usual, her body language speaks loud and clear to him. She's walled and geared up. She's not letting him in anytime soon, and try to fight his way in will only hurt them both. And he doesn't want to hurt her anymore right now, not after all he's put her through.

Still he tries to speak, to let her know that he understands that right now she needs time to put herself together, and that he'll be right there waiting for her, for the time she's back in shape and willing to listen to him telling her that he loves her too.

But he's hardly opened his mouth when she cuts him up, looking out her window.

"Please."

She won't give him room even to say any of it. And after all what's happened, she's earned her right to do so. And he's more than earned the back she's turned on him. So he nods, sighing, and heads to the door.

He pauses before walking out to glance back at her, expecting she may give him a chance to at least meet her eyes one last time, a chance to smile at her.

But she's still looking out and up, at the stormy sky.

And there she lingers, thinking that now she needs to write to Dante again, because she's just found out about yet another circle of hell he's forgotten to mention. And it's the sound of every step Hotch takes as he walks away from her.


	37. Gillian Saga V The Reaping Act Four 9-9

_"__She says nothing at all, but simply stares upwards into the dark sky and watches, with sad eyes, the slow dance of the infinite stars" - Neil Gaiman_

Rossi comes to sit with Jennifer, Morgan and Reid. They're laughing, with both Garcia and Gillian on their computer screen. The rain cancelled the barbeque, the team didn't get a chance to say goodbye to her, so they just called her.

From his solitary seat at the other end of the jet, Hotch allows himself a smile hearing Gillian's trademark version of their conversation last night:

"-and when he tried to apologize, I told him that I'm sick and tired of his chauvinist cave man bullying, and that I'm gonna have his uptight suited ass for this. And then I slapped him —twice, and he grabbed me, and no way to help it, we ended up-."

"Having wild sex on your desk!" Reid laughs.

"Exactly, my dear doctor! My desk, _and_ the couch, _and_ the floor. And if you don't believe me, cupcakes, you can very well go and ask him."

They're all laughing out loud, on board and via computer. They know it's a flagrant lie, but they're glad to know Hotch went to see her, and that they talked. They don't care what was said, only that they did.

Garcia loudly complains: "And in the process, you crashed my system when I tried to access your camera feed! With a worm I myself programmed for you, LT! How _could_ you!"

"You had it coming, baby girl!"

Hotch doesn't pay much attention at what they're saying, but rather listens to her cheerful voice, absorbing it. And his mind can't help to recall those two words he's going to cherish until he makes them come true: _Wednesday breakfast_.

And then he sees her again turning her back on him, asking him to leave her the hell alone.

"Then next week at Dave's?"

"Yeah! And you better tell us about that phone conversation with Cruz!"

"Oh, boy! First I need to know he's not kicking my ass outta the bureau for that!"

_Like Cruz would do something like that_, Hotch thinks.

So she's coming to DC next week.

He knows he cannot push it further than he already did. Now he has to give her all the room she may need. But will she drop by the sixth floor? Will she give him any chance to speak to her?

His smile vanishes as he holds back a sigh.

He knows she won't.


End file.
